Tribune Pulse - March 14, 2019 - Volume III - Issue 11

The International Pediatric Transplant Association (IPTA) is honored to announce that Dr. Oscar Salvatierra is the recipient of the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award given by the International Pediatric Transplant Association at its 10th Congress to be held in Vancouver, BC, Canada this May 2019. Dr. Salvatierra is Professor of Surgery and Pediatrics, Emeritus, at the Stanford School of Medicine, where he has also served as an Advising Dean for Medical Students and Chair of the Faculty Senate. Indeed, Dr. Salvatierra has had a life-long passion for mentoring students, faculty and translational science and social service. He has been regarded as a master technical and compassionate surgeon.

Dr. Salvatierra's scientific contributions to transplantation are numerous, and among them are the development of donor-specific blood transfusion protocol which pre-figured the later development of tolerance protocols using donor-specific bone marrow, in addition to one of the first steroid avoidance protocols in pediatric kidney transplantation. Dr. Salvatierra had a longstanding interest in pediatric kidney transplantation and studied the impact of large adult kidneys being transplanted into very small infants. He has over 300 publications in the medical literature and has served as President of 5 national and international transplant professional societies. He worked for 2 years with former Vice-President Albert Gore and his staff to help draft the National Organ Transplant Act, which established the current 3-tier infrastructure for the US organ transplantation system. Mr. Gore wrote that Dr. Salvatierra "stands above all others as the individual most responsible for bringing groups together to pass P.L.98-507, which has made life better for thousands of transplant patients and their families nation wide." Dr. Salvatierra's honors also include: the introduction of Pope John Paul II for his encyclical on Organ Transplantation and Donation in Rome in the year 2000; the Presidential Medal from the Republic of Argentina; and Knighthood from the Republic of Italy.

World Kidney Day

850 million people worldwide are now estimated to have kidney diseases from various causes. Chronic kidney diseases cause at least 2.4 million deaths per year and are now the 6th fastest-growing cause of death. Acute kidney injury, an important driver of CKD, affects over 13 million people worldwide and kills approximately 1.7 million people annually. This year, World Kidney Day sets out to raise awareness of the high and increasing burden of kidney diseases worldwide and the need for strategies for kidney diseases prevention and management.

Survey Study on Breast Cancer and Transplant Eligibility

Dr. Nancy Ascher and Dr. Chris Freise invite you to participate in a short, 5 minute survey study to investigate how a diagnosis of breast cancer affects transplant eligibility. These results will hopefully improve management recommendations and inform future trials. After participating, you will have the option of receiving the survey results.

To participate in the survey, please click the link below. Thank you for your participation! We appreciate your time!

IPITA 2019 LYON - ABSTRACT SUBMISSION AND AWARDSDeadline for submission of abstracts and AWARD APPLICATIONS has been extended to March 15, 2019

As part of the TTS and IPITA commitment to advancing education and research in Transplantation, the following Awards will be given to abstract presenters in recognition of their contribution. TTS & IPITA Young Investigator AwardAwards will be assigned to 10 young clinicians or scientists (under 35 years of age), who have submitted the ten best abstracts to the IPITA2019 Lyon Congress.The Award will be given to the first author/presenter on the basis of the quality of the contribution to donation or transplantation and the best abstract score.Awards amount to US$ 1.000 each.

Data of the SRTR registry were assessed and stratified by three eras of HCV antiviral therapy: 2003- 2010 dominated by IFN treatment, 2011 – 2013 (treatment with protease inhibitors, PI), and 2014 – 2017 with the utilization of direct-acting antivirals, DAA.

A total of 53,788 patients have been transplanted during the study period with 61.9% being transplanted for HCV, HBV, NASH, or ALD. From 2003 until 2017, liver transplants for HCV declined steadily (35.3% - 23.6%) while indications for NASH and ALD increased (5.8% - 16.5% and 15.6% - 24.0%, respectively). Early graft survival for HCV recipients improved over time; a comparable trend was not observed for patients transplanted with other indications. Similarly, graft survival of HCV recipients improved over time, with 1- and 3-year rates increasing from 83.3% and 71.9%, respectively in the IFN era to 90.9% and 79% in the DAA era.

With the availability of DAA, liver transplant rates for HCV have declined while outcomes have improved. In parallel, transplant rates for NASH have increased; interestingly, graft survival was lowest in recipients with NASH. Ultimately, the clinical focus will need to shift towards prevention and effective therapy of NASH.

In the News

New Mechanism Used by Bacteria to Evade Antibiotics Discovered

March 8 - As bacteria continue to demonstrate powerful resilience to antibiotic treatments–posing a rising public health crisis involving a variety of infections–scientists continue to seek a better understanding of bacterial defences against antibiotics in an effort to develop new treatments. Now, researchers at the University of California San Diego who combine experiments and mathematical modelling have discovered an unexpected mechanism that allows bacteria to survive antibiotics.

Graft Survival After Liver Transplantation for Patients With HCV on Direct-Acting Antivirals

March 7 - While the number of liver transplants for hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the United States has decreased by more than one-third over the past decade, graft survival in HCV-positive recipients has increased and these patients are achieving similar outcomes as recipients without HCV, according to study results published in Liver Transplantation.

New Treatment Has Potential to Minimize Damage After Heart Attack

March 8 - Domainex has announced that a team of its scientists, working in close partnership with Professor Michael Schneider and his team at Imperial College, have found a potential new drug candidate for treating the heart damage caused during a heart attack by targeting the way the heart reacts to stress, according to new research partially funded by the British Heart Foundation (BHF) and published in the journal, Cell Stem Cell

Bioengineered Gel to Reduce Risk of Bone Marrow Transplants

March 11 - Bone marrow transplantation is a potentially life-saving treatment for leukemia, multiple myeloma, and HIV. The procedure involves depleting the patient's immune system, then infusing blood stem cells from a donor, which develop into a new immune system. Unfortunately, during the transplant process, patients are susceptible to disease and infection, making it risky and not recommended in certain cases. Harvard engineers and scientists have developed an injectable, sponge-like gel that may address these challenges.

Adult Stem Cell-Derived Kidney-on-a-Chip in Nature Biotechnology

March 11 - Scientists from the Hubrecht Institute, the University of Utrecht, and MIMETAS have successfully grown kidney tubules derived from human kidney adult stem cells in microfluidic chips. This research has been published in Nature Biotechnology by the world-leading research group from Professor Hans Clevers.

March 8 - Parabiosis experiments in mice have shaped our understanding of the tissue retention properties of tissue-resident memory T cells (TRM). By studying donor and recipient T cells in transplanted lungs, Snyder et al. have provided a rare glimpse into the generation and maintenance of human TRM. Whereas donor T cells were barely detectable in blood within 10 weeks after transplantation, donor TRM were abundant and persisted in transplanted lungs for more than a year. Recipient T cells infiltrating the lung gradually acquired TRM profiles over time as determined by analyses of T cells from bronchoalveolar lavages.

Upcoming Meetings and ANNOUNCEMENTS

IPTA 2019 - May 4-7, 2019 - Vancouver, Canada

IXA 2019 - Abstract Submission Now Open!

2019 TTS TRansplantation Science COmmittee NEWS

Hold the Date - November 10-13, 2019

The TTS Transplantation Science Committee is pleased to announce the 2019 International Transplantation Science Meeting which will be held from November 10-13, 2019 in Clearwater Beach, Florida, USA. This is a joint meeting between TTS, AST and ESOT. More information will soon follow.